The Classic Mystery Collection - Arthur Conan Doyle [2377]
I left my room to go down to the ground floor of the house, and speak to the landlord about finding me a messenger. He happened to be ascending the stairs at the time, and we met on the landing. His son, a quick lad, was the messenger he proposed to me on hearing what I wanted. We had the boy upstairs, and I gave him his directions. He was to take the letter in a cab, to put it into Professor Pesca's own hands, and to bring me back a line of acknowledgment from that gentleman--returning in the cab, and keeping it at the door for my use. It was then nearly half-past ten. I calculated that the boy might be back in twenty minutes, and that I might drive to St. John's Wood, on his return, in twenty minutes more.
When the lad had departed on his errand I returned to my own room for a little while, to put certain papers in order, so that they might be easily found in case of the worst. The key of the old- fashioned bureau in which the papers were kept I sealed up, and left it on my table, with Marian's name written on the outside of the little packet. This done, I went downstairs to the sitting- room, in which I expected to find Laura and Marian awaiting my return from the Opera. I felt my hand trembling for the first time when I laid it on the lock of the door.
No one was in the room but Marian. She was reading, and she looked at her watch, in surprise, when I came in.
"How early you are back!" she said. "You must have come away before the Opera was over."
"Yes," I replied, "neither Pesca nor I waited for the end. Where is Laura?"
"She had one of her bad headaches this evening, and I advised her to go to bed when we had done tea."
I left the room again on the pretext of wishing to see whether Laura was asleep. Marian's quick eyes were beginning to look inquiringly at my face--Marian's quick instinct was beginning to discover that I had something weighing on my mind.
When I entered the bedchamber, and softly approached the bedside by the dim flicker of the night-lamp, my wife was asleep.
We had not been married quite a month yet. If my heart was heavy, if my resolution for a moment faltered again, when I looked at her face turned faithfully to my pillow in her sleep--when I saw her hand resting open on the coverlid, as if it was waiting unconsciously for mine--surely there was some excuse for me? I only allowed myself a few minutes to kneel down at the bedside, and to look close at her--so close that her breath, as it came and went, fluttered on my face. I only touched her hand and her cheek with my lips at parting. She stirred in her sleep and murmured my name, but without waking. I lingered for an instant at the door to look at her again. "God bless and keep you, my darling!" I whispered, and left her.
Marian was at the stairhead waiting for me. She had a folded slip of paper in her hand.
"The landlord's son has brought this for you," she said. "He has got a cab at the door--he says you ordered him to keep it at your disposal."
"Quite right, Marian. I want the cab--I am going out again."
I descended the stairs as I spoke, and looked into the sitting- room to read the slip of paper by the light on the table. It contained these two sentences in Pesca's handwriting--
"Your letter is received. If I don't see you before the time you mention, I will break the seal when the clock strikes."
I placed the paper in my pocket-book, and made for the door. Marian met me on the threshold, and pushed me back into the room, where the candle-light fell full on my face. She held me by both hands, and her eyes fastened searchingly on mine.
"I see!" she said, in a low eager whisper. "You are trying the last chance to-night."
"Yes, the last chance and the